21 Ways to a Happier Depression: A Creative Guide to Getting Unstuck from Anxiety, Setbacks, and Stress

73 Pages·2017·3.31 MB·English

by  Seth Swirsky

Copyright © 2017 by Seth Swirsky
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Published by Sourcebooks, Inc.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Swirsky, Seth, author.
Title: 21 ways to a happier depression : a creative guide to getting unstuck from anxiety, setbacks, and
stress / Seth Swirsky.
Other titles: Twenty one ways to a happier depression Description: Naperville, Illinois : Sourcebooks,
[2017]
Identifiers: LCCN 2016044963 | (hardcover : alk. paper) Subjects: LCSH: Depression, Mental. |
Depression, Mental--Treatment.
Classification: LCC RC537 .S95 2017 | DDC 616.85/27--dc23 LC record available at
https://lccn.loc.gov/2016044963
Contents
Introduction
1. Paintbox
2. Nothing better than a letter
3. Filing can lead to smiling
4. Lighten up
5. Flower power
6. Yes!
7. To thine own self be…complimentary
8. A gift can give a lift
9. Late-hour shower
10. Lowering your emotional temperature
11. Take a coffee brake
12. Time’s a wasting: start cutting and pasting
13. Have something to look forward to
14. Picture this: new pictures!
15. Don’t wait on the weights
16. Box of joy
17. Night at the museum
18. A made bed starts the day ahead
19. Lists for the listless
20. Talk therapy
21. Hair today, gone tomorrow
Contributors
About the Author
Dedicated to my darling daughter, Daisy Claire.

You’re depressed. I get it. I’ve been there. Almost everyone I know has been
there, to varying degrees. For relief from the oftentimes horrific feelings that can
accompany depression and anxiety, some of us take medication. Many of us see
or have seen therapists. Some of us participate in the latest psychological
treatments with important-sounding acronyms: EMDR, CBT, SE. We do these
things in an attempt to make our depression lift. And yet, more often than not,
that hazy, miserable, I’ll-never-beat-this-terrible-feeling persists.
Instead of fighting it, I’ve come up with twenty-one small, simple, specific
tasks that I’ve used over the years to help alleviate my own depression and
anxiety-filled moments. I present them to you in this book. While they cannot
cure depression, these tasks can help make the worst feelings a little less bad—
and a little less bad, when it comes to depression, can be significant.
During my darkest times, using the tasks I outline here gave me needed
respites, which gave me the confidence to face those feelings when they returned
—and knowing that these tasks worked made me not fear the future. As a
clinical psychotherapist, I now share the suggestions in this book with my own
patients, who have been helped by them to a significant degree.
Depression and anxiety are very tough foes. If even one or two of the ideas
contained within these pages can help alleviate your depression, then great—
that’s one or two more coping strategies than you had before. And as those of us
who have battled the behemoth of depression or anxiety know, you can use any
and all the help you can get.
Finally, one might ask why, in this day of easy access to information, we need
this book when a person can just search online for “depression, help!” When you
are feeling depressed, it’s very comforting to have an actual, physical book
around to flip through for a new idea or two, a reminder of all the little victories
you can have. It’s comforting and reassuring, like an old, trusted friend.
So let’s get started. With this book, a happier depression is now, literally, in
your hands.